Blërg.

So I haven't disappeared off the face of the earth- I've just been in the UK visiting my sister Emily for the past 10 or so days. It's been a wild, crazy, confusing, awesome, amazing trip. I'll have to set up a picasa account when I get back to post all of my pictures, and there's no way I could write a travel account of the trip because we've been here so long and b/c almost every day we've gone somewhere new and seen something awesome, so I'll just have to do this in list form. I'm starting with the 5th b/c even though we left on the 3rd at 3 p.m. SLC time, we didn't arrive in the UK until the 4th at like 1 p.m. their time. Maybe 2. It took the rest of the day to deal with jet lag.
5th- Tour of London. Saw Big Ben, toured the Tower of London, saw the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace.
6th- More London- Climbed the Tower Bridge, Saw Windsor Castle, saw Romeo and Juliet at the Globe Theatre
7th- DAY OF REST
8th- Road Trip of Destiny began- went to Stonehenge, Glastonbury Abbey and Tor (if you don't know what those are, PLEASE look them up and be amazed at the awesomeness), Bath, and passed by the Preston Temple.
9th- Kendall England (which has tap water that tastes like Evian or Fiji or something like that!) to Edinburgh. Toured Edinburgh castle, ate Haggis (delish!), and took a tour of the underground Edinburgh crypts. May or may not have taken a picture of a ghost.
10th- More Scotland road trip awesomeness. Ate lunch on the North Sea, climbed the heaths, ended up on a plane from Glasgow to Gatwick.
11th- Took the Eurostar to Paris. Toured Montemarte district of Paris. Climbed the hill to the Sacre Cour Cathedral and saw some really great views. Photos OUTSIDE of the Moulin Rouge (which I love for the art connections to Toulousse, not for the girlie show inside)- ate the world's single greatest crêpes in a park next to an old abbey and a really skeezy looking Carousel.
12th- Met and fell in love with the complete INSANITY that is the city of lights. Saw the outside of the Museé d'Orsay, the Arc d' Triomphe, the Champs Elyseé, the Eiffel Tower, the Champs du Mars, the Ecole Militaire, the outside of the Gran Palais and the Petit Palais, toured the Louvre and took pictures with some really pretty ladies (the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo), and ended up at the Notre Dame Cathedral with critically low blood sugar, dehydration, and a camera full of incredible pictures. I also memorized like 3 metro routes, walked through a street farmer's market, and had some really great Greek food.
13th- Versaille mania, more crêpes, and back to London.
It is now almost 3 am and I have to wake up in like 5 hours to go to church. I will post the corresponding pictures tomorrow after I take a hefty after church nap.
I really miss ice, free refills, King-sized beds, my garden, my dogs, Andrei, and generic brands. I am completely addicted to English yogurt, the metro system, buildings with histories, and charming accents. Everyone here is so friendly and nice and despite what you hear, are really very kind to Americans. Monday we will be returning to London for more pictures with Big Ben and friends, perhaps a tour of Westminster, and a traditional English dinner. We will be leaving pretty early in the morning on Tuesday and will be back late Tuesday night.